this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2024
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I listened to the audiobook last year. It was amazing. Best superhero stories I have experienced. Better than marvel or dc imo. But what do you mean trilogy? Worm is 7000 pages long. Which is like 15 books. Then there is sequel "Ward" which has 9000 pages. I didnt read this one yet. I heard it isn't as good as the first one. Maybe when I will have more time. As far as I know there isn't anything after Ward.
There are 2 audiobooks for Worm. One is older, fan made. Where every chapter is narrated by diffrent person, mostly guys I think. I didn't listen to this one. I like consistency. Second is new. Fanmade too. Finished last year. Narrated by a woman, which fits better when main character is a woman too. Only interludes are by diffrent narrators. This one is very good. The narrator isnt perfect, but better than some professionals I listened to. It is 170 h long. I finished it in less than 3 weeks.
Here is a link https://abaddonproductions.org/category/worm/ Or you can find it with podcast apps like AntennaPod.
Ward isn't necessarily worse; just different. I personally like Ward more, but understand why people wouldn't. I highly recommend giving it a try if you liked Worm, you'll still enjoy it.
In what way is it diffrent? Is it slower and has less action/fights? If that is the case then that is no problem for me. Is Panacea and Dragon there? Are they a side or main characters? I really liked them in Worm, and felt they were unutilized. What about those titans? I don't remember exactly how it ended for them, but I think some of them should be still alive, like that angel lady. Are they a big part of the narrative?
Worm is a lot more regularly intense than Ward is; Taylor is the queen of escalation and the narrative reflects that, never really giving her (or the reader) time to breathe. Meanwhile Ward's protagonist actively tries to take time off, de-escalate, be mindful, and it does affect the pacing. There's slightly fewer action scenes, but they're just as good, if not better in some cases.
As far as I remember, Dragon shows up a few times but isn't as important as in Worm. Panacea does appear, with a pretty important, controversial, and spoileriffic role in the story.
The Endbringers don't come back in for a while, but they do show up and they do end up being pretty important. If you enjoyed Leviathan's and Behemoth's fights, you will absolutely adore pretty much the entire back half of Ward's action.
Ward's side characters also shine a lot more than Worm's, in my opinion, and I think it's because the author just had more experience writing by the time he did Ward. Rain is probably my favorite protagonist cape in the series, for example.
Okay, this didn't discourage me at all. I am actually a little excited to start it now. You said that the main protagonist often takes time off and stuff like that, could Ward be described as "slice of life"?
I am a little disappointed that the dragon doesn't have a bigger role.
I will have to go with audiobook version. I love books but I am a slow reader. When I read normal books or ebooks I finish like 20 per year. Three years ago I switched almost exclusively to audiobooks and now I am going through 130 plus books per year.
Reading ward would take me probably whole year. While listening to the audiobook, I would be done maybe in 3-4 weeks.
Do you know if there is more audiobook versions? I found only one.
https://parahumanaudio.com/series/ward-audiobook/
I didn't try it yet and I don't know if it's any good but if it's the only version I can be picky.
Do you know what the original commenter meant by this being a trilogy? Is there something after ward?
Did you read other works of the author like Twig, Pact, Pale? Are they any good? And are they in any way related to parahumans?
I'm not sure on audiobooks, I read Ward as it was being written, starting when it was in like chapter 6 or 7. I don't think the first audiobook was finished for months after the end.
I wouldn't call Ward slice-of-life, necessarily, but there are a few parts I can think of off-hand like a little shopping trip, some therapy, etc that Taylor would never have had time for in Worm. These go away as the story progresses, but they're nice, and a good look into how the protagonists are feeling and dealing with the situation.
Less Dragon is a bit of a bummer, but hopefully the myriad of new capes ends up balancing that for you.
As for Wildbow's other works, I haven't had the time to focus on reading any (thanks life), but I know a lot of people think Pact and Pale are his best works, so I am excited to get into those someday. If I remember right, pact and twig have little cameos in Ward, like TV shows or books or something, and Worm has similar cameos in those works too.
The hopes for a trilogy are probably not gonna happen unfortunately, he's said that he's pretty tired of the genre and how some parts of the fandom reacted to Ward's style and story direction. Tbh I'm not sure what a third entry would even look like, but I said that before I knew about Ward too, so who knows!
Dragon's not completely gone; she's just attending to other stuff while the characters are handling their slice of things. She does show up more towards the end, IIRC. I think she also had some plot resolution; though my memory is fuzzy here.
And some of my other favorites feature in Ward!